Posted on July 11: Better environmental protection means lower health care costs: McMaster study

Cities that spend more on environmental protection spend less on health care costs, a McMaster Institute of Environment and Health study shows.

In the first Canadian study to ever examine the link between the cost of pollution and health care costs, researchers found that Ontario counties with higher pollution outputs tend to have higher per capita health care expenditures, while those that spend more on defending environmental quality through spending on areas such as sewer and water works, waste management, emergency planning and recreational facilities spend less on health care.

McMaster University researchers Michael Jerrett, John Eyles and Stephen Birch, along with University of Waterloo researcher Christian Dufournaud examined data on toxic pollution reported by industries to Environment Canada and all hospital and OHIP billings. These billings covered areas such as surgeries, asthma and cancer treatments and equipment purchases. The researchers studied data from all of Ontario's 49 counties and regions.

“This is one of only two studies in the world that assesses the relationships among environmental pollution, environmental protection programs and healthcare expenditures,” said medical geographer Michael Jerrett, principal investigator for the study and an air pollution expert. “It shows what many people feel intuitively after the Walkerton crisis, environmental pollution negatively affects our healthcare system. It also suggests that cuts to environmental and public health protection programs can lead to many downstream costs, including more pressure on our healthcare system. It's fine for governments to promise maintenance of our healthcare system, but to do so at the expense of other upstream protective public health programs will likely lead to more pressure on the healthcare system and a lower quality of care.”

Medical geographer John Eyles, the institute's director, adds: “Investing for the health of our communities is not simply a matter of investing in conventional medical care facilities. These are vitally important, but significant benefit may be gained from environmental improvements and over time those improvements may reduce the need for increased health care expenditures.”

The study found that the average amount spent per person on environmental quality was $680. When the authors compared regions with the highest environmental expenditures to those with the lowest, they found a $200 per person reduction in healthcare expenditures. Comparing the most to the least polluted area, the authors reported a $355 per person increase in health care expenditures. The study used data from the 1991 Canadian census, the Municipal Financial Information System and the National Pollutant Release Inventory.

The research was funded by the federal government's tri-council environmental research program including the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and the former Medical Research Council (MRC).

The study, published recently in the international publication Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, is available at www.jech.com.